Fun at the Track

The track I am talking about is the road race course and not what most Americans do, the drag strip. In fact I have yet to run my car at the drag strip despite over three years of ownership. I might do it someday just to get an idea of what my car and my skills can do at the drag strip. But, IMHO, the real fun is at the road course and not the drag strip. Below, I have compiled a series of e-mails that I have submitted to the SE-R mailing list and to the SoCal-SERCA mailing list. These are e-mails sent to the lists just after the track events. They have an element of bravado in them, but that could not be avoided :-)

The 2000 Hot lapping Season

·         Willow Springs Raceway, April 2000. That was my first ever track event at the track dubbed "the fastest track in the West." I had a blast. Unfortunately, I could not find the e-mail that I sent to the SE-R mailing list :-(

·         Buttonwillow Raceway, June 2000. My first time at Buttonwillow and my second time at the track. This time I had race tires. The car felt much better with those :-)

·         Buttonwillow Raceway, August 10-11, 2000. My second time at Buttonwillow and my times begin to drop. The most exciting event was my "battle" with an instructor driving a Type R. Read on.

·         Buttonwillow Raceway, September 30-October 1, 2000. This event was a special one. I used to do a lot of trash talking on Club Si in the SVA forum. This event was held as a shoot-out between the Club Si folks and the SE-R.net folks. Guess what...The Si boys did not show up. It was finally confirmed that they are riceboys after all. I managed to get my fastest time during this event, an official 2:15.537, second only to Rob Cadle from SE-R.net. It seems that the Quaife LSD that was installed in the tranny was working :-)

The 2001 Hot lapping Season

·         Buttonwillow Raceway, February 11-12, 2001. The first event of the 2001 season with NASA. This time I had the Truechoice suspension. I managed to bring my times down from 2:15 to 2:11, unofficially of course :-) AFAIK, That makes my SE-R the fastest at Buttonwillow.

·         Willow Springs, April 6-7, 2001. I return to Big Willow one year after my first event. It was a rainy and shinny weekend. This is my first time going with SpeedTrials USA. I really enjoyed running with them. I get my first major off the track excursion. Very scary stuff. Otherwise, it was a pretty fun weekend.

·         Buttonwillow Raceway, April 21-22, 2001. This is my second event in one month. Let me tell you that it gets exhausting and expensive to do two events in one month. This is the first time running in the open passing run group. You can pass anywhere on the track using caution. The closest thing to racing that you will get. I had three very exciting "battles" during this event. I also Christened my second set of Toyo RA-1 tires.

   Buttonwillow Raceway, June 9-10, 2001. For some reason neither NASA or SpeedTrials hold events during May :-( I do not understand why!!! But this event was great. Few cars on the track and we were running CCW with the Star Mazda Turn, something I have never done before. This is the first event that I encounter a minor mechanical difficulty that requires a trip to Bakersfield.

• Streets Of Willow, July 7-8, 2001. I only ran three laps of this event. My car broke down :-( Luckily, Speedtrials USA agreed to credit my track fee to the next track event. I ended up having to buy a used tranny (that is what broke) and installing it. The car was running one week after it broke. Alas, I am running without a Quaife. But I still have a stock VLSD.

• Willow Springs Raceway, August 11-12, 2001. During this event the car ran flawlessly. I attended a Driving Concepts racing school and got certified for an NASA rcaing License. Next step is to actually race. Pretty soon hot lapping will be a thing of the past for me :-) This also the first time at the track with the C3 race cams and a 7800 rev limiter and no speed limiter on the ECU.

• Streets of Willow & Willow Springs, August 24-26, 2001. This is my first three day event at the track. I attended Streets on Friday and Big Willow on Saturday and Sunday. This time I had a Hotlapper and was able to get some official times on street tires. Yes, my race tires are shot again. Time for a third set of race tires.

• Streets of Willow, October 12, 2001. This was the first official SoCal SERCA event. It was a one day Friday event. It was a great event, very well organized and concieved. Drivers had tons of track time. It was also my first time to instruct. Click and see how I did :-)

• Buttonwillow Raceway, November 24-25, 2001. This was a very fun event. This is the first time I go with Green Flag Racing Association. I had a blast. I will go again with them if need be. The little SE-R impressed a lot of people who did not know what it was at first. By the end of the weekend drivers and corner worker were heaping the complements on driver and car alike :-) The car has 1931 hot lapping miles to date. I was able to log 84 hotlaps at this event, a total of 277 miles.

The 2002 Race Season

• Buttonwillow Raceway, March 2-3, 2002. This is my first ever race weekend. This is actual door to door racing with NASA in the newly created SE-R Cup Series. The car had a new engine due to a catastrophic engine failure prior to the inaugural SE-R Cup race in February. Now the engine makes 152 hp, 11 hp less than before, but 130 lb-ft of torque, 6 lb-ft more than before. This is because the car is now running the less aggressive S4 cams with the stock springs.

• Buttonwillow Raceway, April 6-7, 2002. My second race weekend was filled with mental errors and mechanical failure. On Saturday I miss the grid and on Sunday I break the transmition. I still managed to gain points and solidify my 2nd place in the championship. So all was not lost.

• Willow Springs Raceway, June 8-9, 2002. My luck finally turned after a mechanical failure early on Saturday. I qualify on Pole for both races and go one to win twice.

• Buttonwillow Raceway, July 13-14, 2002. This is my first race in the SRX class. I have given up on the SR class due to issues with rule enfrocement. I ditched over 500 points in SR and I am starting from scratch in SRX. I do not expect to win the class since Jeff has a huge lead. Luckily, he fails to show up for this race and that allows me to catch up a bit.

• Las Vegas Speedway, August, 10-11, 2002. This weekend turned out to be a disaster. I win the night race and come second in the Sunday afternoon race, but I over heat the car and blow up the engine. This trip was not worth it at all. Never race in Vegas in the summer. The good thing is that I managed to gain on Jeff by some 90 points.

• Willow Springs Raceway, September 7-8, 2002. Jude and I installed a JDM SR20DE engine. I bought two of these engines and I kept one as a spare. The cost was $275 per engine. It is amazing how cheap the SE-Rs are to fix. We had to test the engine during the parctice on Saturday and all was fine. On Sunday we had a short in the wiring of the kill switch and two laps at most.

• Buttonwillow Raceway, October, 12-13, 2002. I only race for one day during this weekend. I was suspended for Saturady for a rule infraction during the September race. I was suppoed to get off the track when the car slowed down but I did not, oh well. I did not do a write-up for the race. So I will simply place Tom Paule's write-up in there.

• Willow Springs Raceway, November, 23-24, 2002. This is the last race of the season. I have already taken 1st place in SRX class and I still had a shot at taking 3rd palce in SR class. I had to come in 2nd on the first race and win outright in the second race. As luck would have it, this is exactly what happened.